Her Husband's Horror
by TotalCSIfan
Summary: Jackie has to deal with one of Nick's biggest demons. Please read and review!


"Sue, I'll take your recess duty, you're not feeling well and plus you took mine one day last week when I had a parent come in to talk to me."

"No you won't, I've got it." Sue argued.

Jackie wasn't surprised that her friend argued with her, she never allowed people to do anything nice for her yet she was always the first person to help others when they needed it.

"I'm doing it." Jackie said firmly.

"You are not, this is your prep. You shouldn't have to give up your free time for me."

"Oh, that's right, you've never done anything nice for me, I forgot." Jackie said sarcastically.

"Would you quit it?" Sue asked.

"I'm not giving up Sue, I'm taking the kids outside."

"I'm not going to give up either, let's flip a coin to settle this, the winner goes out." Sue suggested.

For a split second Jackie thought about shouting **no way**, thinking about what happened to Nick the last time he flipped a coin to try to settle an argument but Jackie caught herself before she made herself look like an idiot. _You're being ridiculous." _She scolded herself.

"Ok, I'll take heads." She said.

"Fine." Sue agreed as she reached into her pocket and pulled out a quarter.

"It's tails." Sue said.

"Sue, that is a lie, that was heads, nice try though, I'm taking the kids outside, I want the fresh air anyways." Jackie said before turning her attention to her students who were lined up in the doorway of her classroom, impatiently waiting to go outside for recess.

"Our voices are off in the hallway boys and girls." Jackie reminded them as she led her class outside.

"Follow Mrs. Stokes' class." Sue mumbled to her class once all of Jackie's students had exited Jackie's classroom.

Jackie actually enjoyed recess duty when it was nice out, she enjoyed getting outside and she liked to see the kids having fun. Recess was going great, the kids were having fun, it was beautiful outside, and no little kids had come to her crying saying they had gotten hurt. Five minutes before recess ended though that changed.

"Mrs. Stokes, Aiden's hurt." A little girl said sounding totally panicked as she raced up to Jackie.

"Let's go look." Jackie said calmly as she walked with the little girl over to where a little boy sat by the building.

"What's wrong buddy?" Jackie asked the little boy.

Aiden was one of the nicest kids you'd ever want to meet, Jackie wished he could be in her class again next year.

Jackie was expecting a bloody knee or a scraped hand but what she saw completely caught her off guard. When Jackie looked down at the little boy her eyes widened in horror, he had a trail of red ants crawling up his arm. The horrific memories of seeing Nick on that video trapped in that glass coffin with him screaming at the top of his lungs raced in Jackie's mind. The little boy looked at Jackie with terrified eyes.

"Mrs. Stokes, I was sitting here making you a card and the next thing I know these bugs are crawling on me, am I going to die?" The little boy asked sounding absolutely horrified at the possibility.

"No sweetie you are going to be just fine, I need you to listen to me very carefully.

"Ok." The little boy said.

"I need you to hold very still." Jackie said as she got down on her haunches.

"Ok." The little boy said again.

"I'm going to rub your arm, I won't hurt you." She promised.

Aiden nodded.

Jackie quickly ran her fingers down the boy's arm, causing the ants to fall to the ground. Aiden did what he was told and held very still.

"Ok good, now run Aiden." Jackie instructed him once the ants were back on the cement, fearing that's they'd crawl on him again if he didn't.

The little boy took off like a rocket, racing near the doorway of the school. Jackie hurriedly walked over to him.

"Did I get all the ants?" She asked the little boy.

"I think so." He said.

"Ok, I want you to go into the bathroom, go into a bathroom stall, take your shirt off, and then I want you to shake your shirt very hard, in case there are any ants in your shirt. After you do that come right back outside." Jackie told him.

"Ok Mrs. Stokes." He said.

He went inside the school. He came back outside a few minutes later.

"Mrs. Stokes, I did just what you said, I shook my shirt really hard."

"Good job, are you ok?" She asked.

"Yeah, there wasn't any ants in my shirt." He replied happily.

"Good, did any bite your arm?"

"Nope." He said.

"That's good." Jackie replied.

"Yeah it is." He told her.

She smiled as he ran off happily. A couple minutes later he came back with tears in his eyes.

"What's wrong?" Jackie asked sort of panicked, thinking he had gotten bit after all.

"The card that I was making for you must have blown away, it's gone." He said.

"Oh, sweetie, it's ok, don't worry about it." She assured him.

"But I wanted to give it to you." He said.

"How about this: Tomorrow I don't have recess duty, if you want you can stay in with me and make me a new card, but you don't have to." She added quickly, not wanting the little boy to feel obligated to miss his recess.

"Ok I will." He said before he took off to go play once again.

Fifteen minutes later they had gone back inside.

Jackie sat at her desk editing writing papers while her students sat at their desks working on a vocabulary worksheet.

"Mrs. Stokes" One little girl said as she came up to Jackie's desk.

"Hmmm?" Jackie said as she looked up from the writing papers.

"I don't know the answer to this one, will you help me?" the sweet little girl asked as she pointed to one of the questions.

Jackie took the worksheet from her so she could see it better. She had just begun reading it when she felt a sharp stabbing pain in her hand.

"Ouch." She said.

She thought for a second that the little girl had accidently poked her with the sharp pencil in her hand but when she looked down at her hand Jackie realized that wasn't even close to the case. On her hand was a red ant. The little girl saw it about the same time Jackie did and screamed.

She then ran out of the room "Help. Mrs. Stokes got bit by a bug and now she's going to die." She screamed loudly in the hallway sounding absolutely terrified.

Within seconds five other teachers appeared in Jackie's room.

"I'm fine." Jackie said completely humiliated, but she wasn't at all angry at the little girl, she was just trying to help.

"What happened?" Lisa Masters asked.

"I just got bit by a fire ant, it's no big deal." Jackie assured them with a smile.

Sue Anderson came over to Jackie's desk and looked at the now red and swollen bump on her friend's hand.

"See you should have let me take the kids out for recess." Sue said as she pointed her finger at her friend accusingly.

"Oh zip it." Jackie said as she rolled her eyes.

Her teaching friends did not know the details about Nick's kidnapping, if they had Jackie knew Sue would have been more sympathetic.

"Are you sure you're ok?" One of the other teachers asked.

"Yeah." Jackie said.

"You should put something on that." Lisa advised her friend.

"I will, I always keep cream in my desk for when the kids fall and get hurt at recess." Jackie said.

Her friends gave her one last smile before leaving her classroom so they could return to their own.

Jackie put some of the cream on her hand and then slapped a band aide on it.

When Jackie got home that night she made ham and mashed potatoes for dinner. While they were eating Nick noticed the band aide on her hand.

"What happened?" He asked, nodding towards her bandaged hand before he shoved a bite of mashed potatoes in his mouth.

"Paper cut." Jackie lied.

Nick nodded, thinking nothing of it.

That night as Nick slept Jackie lay wide awake, her bite was throbbing, it almost felt like she'd been burned. She got up and put more cream on it and when she laid back down she rubbed it.

She'd always known that Nick had gone through horrible pain in that glass coffin but she now knew just how horrendous that ordeal must have been for him.

As she looked over at Nick she smiled with pride, her husband was a truly remarkably strong human being.

The End!


End file.
